Tag Archives: Robert Lynch

Out with a bang?

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The maker of everybody’s favorite M16 rifle, gunmaker Colt Defense, has filed for bankruptcy. Famous for perennial firepower darlings, the Colt .45 and the “Peacemaker” – aka the gun that won the West – Colt saw delays in orders from both the US and foreign militaries, not to mention less demand for the company’s sport rifles, that caused its numbers to go into the red. Filing for chapter 11 in Wilmington, Delaware, the arms company already hit up Morgan Stanley for a $70 million loan, back in November, just to make an interest payment. Colt currently has about $500 million in assets and Chief Restructuring Officer Keith Maib wants to assure the public that “Colt remains open for business” while it attempts to figure out how to redo its balance sheets. Incidentally, this is not the company’s first trip down bankruptcy road. Colt, which was started by Samuel Colt back in 1836, also hit the bankruptcy skids back in 1842. The company rebounded and Samuel Colt went on to become one the country’s wealthiest men.

If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em…

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Target’s ditching its pharmacy business in a $1.9 billion deal with CVS. The retailer came to some conclusions about the whole operation which basically had to do with money, and how much of it the pharmacy division wasn’t making. In fact, Target was actually losing money on it. Part of the problem is that the Affordable Care Act was just making everything so darn complicated and well, CVS is more equipped to handle the constantly changing landscape of healthcare while Target is best suited to sell stuff that consumers want and need but that don’t require prescriptions. So basically, Target is taking the pharmacies it already has housed in its locations and magically transforming them into CVS stores. Target expects that will bring in more traffic to its stores as CVS enthusiasts will flock to Target/CVS stores to get their prescriptions filled and then be compelled to step inside the store, filling up their red shopping carts with the kind of merchandise on which Target intends to place an increased focus to increase sales. Funny how that works, huh?

Saw it coming…

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The latest executive to bite the Lumber Liquidators’ sawdust is Chief Merchandising Officer William Shlegel. The executive was on the job for four years before that scathing “60 Minutes” report aired back in March accusing the company of using formaldehyde-laced laminate flooring form China. Shlegel will be replaced by Chief marketing Officer Marco Pescara, who will pull double duty as he stays in his post while assuming his soon-to-be-former colleague’s role as well. No statement or comment was offered by Lumber Liquidators as to why Shlegel was shown the door, nor were there any comments about what, if any, his role was in the formaldehyde-laced flooring disaster. Of course, this latest switcheroo doesn’t even begin to solve the company’s tsunami of problems as the Justice Department is still seeking criminal charges against Lumber Liquidators, while it faces more than 100 class-action lawsuits. Sales of all the toxic flooring from China has been halted at the 360 locations. In the meantime, Lumber liquidators founder Thomas Sullivan has been playing CEO since the previous one, Robert Lynch ungraciously bowed out last month. The stock, to the surprise of…no one, has lost over 70% of its value in the last twelve months.

Gee I wonder why…

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If you find yourself up for a challenging career change, look no further than embattled Lumber Liquidators, who now has a job opening…for a new CEO. After months of scrutiny and criticism following a scathing “60 Minutes” report about its dangerously high-levels of formaldehyde-laced flooring, Lumber Liquidators CEO Robert Lynch threw in his corporate towel. He officially resigned from the company and stepped down from the board of directors. Shares of the company took a 16% hit before the market even opened following the news of Lynch’s resignation, adding to the slide that Lumber Liquidators has been taking for months now. In fact, its stock is down more than 60% for the year. However, in Lumber Liquidator’s defense, 97% of its products found in its flooring already installed in customers’ homes was found to be within protective guidelines. As for that other 3%…well, I suppose that explains why the company is under federal investigation.

Best ever?

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Best Buy managed to score some impressive earnings with a big fiscal shout out to big-screen tv’s and “iconic” smart-phones. In case it wasn’t obvious, CEO Hubert Joly deems the iPhone 6 and Galaxy S6 “iconic.” Other money-makers for the company were home appliances, which makes perfect sense since the housing market is easing up (sort of, see below) making it easier for people to actually afford their homes, which they then need to fill with super convenient items like ovens and refrigerators. Just try living without them. Shares of the stock gleefully went up 7% before the market opened as the company announced it pulled in a profit of $129 million with 36 cents per share added, even though Wall Street only expected the electronics giant to post a 29 cent per share gain. A year ago the company pulled in a $461 million with $1.31 per share added, except that was all because of a tax change, so the year-over-year comparison is almost a moot point. The company saw revenues of $8.56 billion which was actually a slight drop from last year. But again, no one is too concerned because a.) analysts predicted revenues of only $8.46 billion b.) Best Buy is saying au revoir to 66 stores in Canada (yes, just like Target) so a loss of revenue was expected. Oh, Canada. c.) the strong dollar has been messing with very company’s earnings and why should Best Buy be any different.

Is it? Or isn’t it?

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Once again, leave it to the housing market to toy with our fiscal emotions. April proved to be nothing short of a bummer as sales of existing homes dropped, according to the National Association of Realtors. The culprit, it seems, is the fact that there are not as many listing, and the prices for homes are higher. Supply and demand, I tell you. Arghh!!! Just a little over 5 million homes were sold in April representing a 3% drop. And nobody likes a drop. Part of the problem is that people aren’t listing their homes. Maybe they just like the ones in which they are currently living. Maybe they don’t see listings that they like. In any case, the median price for a home these days is hovering around $219,000, almost 9% more than a year ago. Of course building more homes is a logical way to fix this housing inventory issue. And builders are doing just that, as evidenced by the rise in new building applications recently reported. But the problem is that building a new home can take about a year and who wants to wait that long to see some housing recovery?